Fresh FIR against Mehul Choksi for defrauding IFCI of Rs 22 crore
India Today
CBI has registered a fresh FIR against fugitive diamond trader Mehul Choksi for defrauding IFCI of Rs 22 crore between 2014 and 2018.
Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) has lodged a fresh FIR against fugitive diamond trader Mehul Choksi and his firm Geetanjali Gems for defrauding the Industrial Finance Corporation of India Ltd (IFCI) of Rs 22 crore between 2014 and 2018.
This fraud by Choksi is in addition to the previous case in which he is accused of defrauding the Punjab National Bank of Rs 13,000 crore along with Nirav Modi.
According to CBI, a written complaint was received from IFCI in November 2020 alleging that Mehul Choksi's firm and other accused persons between 2014 to 2018 were parties to a criminal conspiracy to cheat IFCI.
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“In pursuance to the aforesaid criminal conspiracy, Gitanjali Gems Ltd through its Director Mehul Choksi approached IFCI seeking financial assistance for meeting its long term working capital requirement and induced IFCI to sanction a corporate loan of Rs 25 crore in March, 2016. This loan was sanctioned and disbursed in favor of Gitanjali Gems,” the FIR said.
It has been alleged in the complaint that IFCI relying on the representation, assurances and undertakings of Geetanjali Gems as well as Mehul Choksi and the value of the pledged jewels on the basis of valuation conducted by Surajmal Lallu Bhai & Co, Narendra Jhaveri, Pradip C. Shah and Shrenik R. Shah had disbursed the entire loan amount of Rs 25 crore on the basis of security cover of two times based on the pledge of shares and the pledge of the gold, diamond and gold studded jewellery.
“It is further alleged in the complaint that Geetanjali Gems had started committing defaults in the repayment of loan installments and in order to recover the defaulted amount of the installments, IFCI invoked the pledge and out of total pledged 20,60,064 number of shares, IFCI could only sell 6,48,822 number of shares amounting to Rs 4.07 crore as the client ID of Mehul Choksi was suspended by NSDL,” added the FIR.
